Mona Lisa | painting by Leonardo da Vinci | Britannica.com painting by Leonardo da Vinci Written By: sfumato Mona Lisa, oil painting on a poplar wood panel by the Italian painter, draftsman, sculptor, architect, and engineer Leonardo da Vinci , probably the world’s most-famous painting . It was painted sometime between 1503 and 1519, when Leonardo was living in Florence , and it now hangs in the Louvre , in Paris , where it remains an object of pilgrimage in the 21st century. The poplar panel shows evidence of warping and was stabilized in 1951 with the addition of an oak frame and in 1970 with four vertical braces. Dovetails also were added, to prevent the widening of a small crack visible near the centre of the upper edge of the painting. The sitter’s mysterious smile and her unproven identity have made the painting a source of ongoing investigation and fascination.

Mona Lisa, oil painting on a poplar wood panel by Leonardo da Vinci, … The Print Collection—Heritage-Images Overview of Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, with a discussion of the … Contunico © ZDF Enterprises GmbH, Mainz The Mona Lisa and its influence These signs of aging distract little from the painting’s effect. In its exquisite synthesis of sitter and landscape, the Mona Lisa set the standard for all future portraits. The painting presents a woman in half-body portrait, which has as a backdrop a distant landscape. Yet this simple description of a seemingly standard composition gives little sense of Leonardo’s achievement. The sensuous curves of the sitter’s hair and clothing, created through sfumato (use of fine shading), are echoed in the shapes of the valleys and rivers behind her. The sense of overall harmony achieved in the painting—especially apparent in the sitter’s faint smile—reflects Leonardo’s idea of the cosmic link connecting humanity and nature, making this painting an enduring record of Leonardo’s vision. Britannica Stories Ringling Bros. Folds Its Tent There has been much speculation and debate regarding the identity of the portrait’s sitter.

Scholars and historians have posited numerous interpretations, including that she is Lisa del Giocondo (née Gherardini), the wife of the Florentine merchant Francesco di Bartolomeo del Giocondo, hence the alternative title to the work, La Gioconda. That identity was first suggested in 1550 by artist biographer Giorgio Vasari . Another theory was that the model may have been Leonardo’s mother, Caterina. That interpretation was put forth by, among others, Sigmund Freud , who seemed to think that the Mona Lisa’s mysterious smile emerged from a—perhaps unconscious—memory of Caterina’s smile. A third suggestion was that the painting was, in fact, Leonardo’s self-portrait, given the resemblance between the sitter’s and the artist’s facial features. Some scholars suggested that disguising himself as a woman was the artist’s riddle. The sitter’s identity has not been conclusively proven. In an attempt to settle the debate, art and forensic experts in August 2013 opened the tomb of the Giocondo family in Florence in order to find Lisa del Giocondo’s remains, test her DNA, and recreate an image of her face.

Whatever the sitter’s identity, the influence of the Mona Lisa on the Renaissance and later times has been enormous. The Mona Lisa revolutionized contemporary portrait painting . Leonardo’s preliminary drawings encouraged other artists to make more and freer studies for their paintings and stimulated connoisseurs to collect those drawings. Through the drawings his Milanese works were made known to the Florentines. Also, his reputation and stature as an artist and thinker spread to his fellow artists and assured for them a freedom of action and thought similar to his own. One such painter was the young Raphael , who sketched Leonardo’s work in progress and adopted the Mona Lisa format for his portraits; it served as a clear model for his Portrait of Maddalena Doni (c. 1506). Art & Architecture: Fact or Fiction? Leonardo even influenced the fashion in which artists dressed their subjects.

In his Treatise on Painting, published long after his death, he wrote that art should avoid the fashion: As far as possible avoid the costumes of your own day.…Costumes of our period should not be depicted unless it be on tombstones, so that we may be spared being laughed at by our successors for the mad fashions of men and leave behind only things that may be admired for their dignity and beauty. Connect with Britannica The Mona Lisa demonstrates this aspect of his treatise perfectly in that La Giaconda is dressed in a coloured shift, loosely pleated at the neck, instead of the tight clothes that were then popular. Other Mona Lisas At least a dozen excellent replicas of the Mona Lisa exist, many of them by the master’s students. The proliferation of Mona Lisas reflects, at least in part, the subject’s almost immediate embodiment of the ideal woman—beautiful, enigmatic , receptive, and still just out of reach. Over the centuries this quintessential woman has taken on a new life in popular culture .

In the 20th century alone, her iconic status was mocked in schoolboy fashion—the addition of a mustache and goatee to a postcard reproduction—in Marcel Duchamp ’s readymade, L.H.O.O.Q. (1919). His irreverent defacing of this best known of iconic paintings expressed the Dadaists ’ scorn for the art of the past, which in their eyes was part of the infamy of a civilization that had produced the horrors of the First World War just ended. Andy Warhol too took aim at the painting’s status, in his 1963 serigraph Mona Lisa. Mona Lisa off the wall References in the visual arts have been complemented by musical examinations. La Giaconda’s personality and quirks were examined in a 1915 opera by Max von Schillings.

Leonardo’s portrait is also the inspiration for the classic song “ ” by American lyricist Ray Evans and songwriter Jay Harold Livingston: Mona Lisa, Mona Lisa You’re so like the lady with the mystic smile Is it only ’cause you’re lonely They have blamed you For that Mona Lisa strangeness in your smile Do you smile to tempt a lover, Mona Lisa Or is this your way to hide a broken heart Many dreams have been brought to your doorstep They just lie there, and they die there Are you warm, are you real, Mona Lisa Or just a cold and lonely, lovely work of art Britannica Lists & Quizzes Mona Lisa, 1504 - Leonardo da Vinci - WikiArt.org Leonardo da Vinci Copyright Information close The author of this artwork died more than 70 years ago. According to U.S. Copyright Law, copyright expires 70 years after the author's death. In other countries, legislation may differ. More … WikiArt.org allows unlimited copying, distributing and displaying of the images of public domain artworks solely. We use here Copyright term based on authors' deaths according to U.S. Copyright Law, that is 70 years. In other countries, the duration of copyright term may differ.

Please check here copyright length according to your country's legislation before you consider reproducing images borrowed from Wikipaintings.org Artworks protected by copyright are supposed to be used only for contemplation. Images of that type of artworks are prohibited for copying, printing, or any kind of reproducing and communicating to public since these activities may be considered copyright infringement. Dimensions: 77 x 53 cm Location: Louvre, Paris, France Image dimension 397x600px, View all sizes The Mona Lisa (La Gioconda or La Joconde, or Portrait of Lisa Gherardini, wife of Francesco del Giocondo) is a half-length portrait of a woman by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci, which has been acclaimed as "the best known, the most visited, the most written about, the most sung about, the most parodied work of art in the world." The painting, thought to be a portrait of Lisa Gherardini, the wife of Francesco del Giocondo, is in oil on a poplar panel, and is believed to have been painted between 1503 and 1506.

It was acquired by King Francis I of France and is now the property of the French Republic, on permanent display at the Musée du Louvre in Paris. The ambiguity of the subject's expression, frequently described as enigmatic, the monumentality of the composition, the subtle modeling of forms and the atmospheric illusionism were novel qualities that have contributed to the continuing fascination and study of the work. Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci – Facts & History of the Painting View Complete Works The Mona Lisa is quite possibly the most well-known piece of painted artwork in the entire world. It was painted by the Leonardo Da Vinci, the famous Italian artist, between 1504 and 1519, and is a half body commission for a woman named Lisa Gherardini. Her husband, Francesco Del Giocondo requested the work by Da Vinci just after the turn of the century. It is perhaps the most studied piece of artwork ever known. The subject’s facial expression has brought about a source of debate for centuries, as her face remains largely enigmatic in the portrait. Originally commissioned in Italy, it is now at home in the French Republic, and hangs on display in the Louvre in Paris.

Background The work was requested by subject’s husband, Francesco Del Giocondo. Lisa was from a well-known family known through Tuscany and Florence and married to Francesco Del Giocondo who was a very wealthy silk merchant. The work was to celebrate their home’s completion, as well as a celebration of the birth of their second son. Not until 2005 was the identity of Mona Lisa‘s subject fully understood, though years of speculation have suggested the true identity of the painting’s subject. Leonardo da Vinci The Mona Lisa is famous for a variety of reasons. One of the reasons, of course, for the popularity of the painting is the artist himself. Leonardo da Vinci is perhaps the most recognized artist in the world. Not only was Da Vinci an artist, but he was also a scientist, inventor, and a doctor. His study of the human form came from the study of actual human cadavers. Because of his ability to study from the actual form of the human, he was able to draw and paint it more accurately than any other artist of his time. While the Mona Lisa may be revered as the greatest piece of artwork of all time, Da Vinci was known more for his ability to draw than to paint.

Currently there are only a handful of paintings of Da Vinci’s, mostly because of his largely experimental style of art, and his habit of procrastination. Among his most famous sketches is the Vitruvian Man, which anybody who has ever studied anatomy, human biology, or art knows very well. But most prominently Da Vinci has been known throughout the centuries as a scientist and inventor. Amongst his ideas were a rudimentary helicopter and a tank. Some of his more notable paintings include the Mona Lisa, of course, as well as The Last Supper. He used a variety of different surfaces to paint on, attributing to a lot of his failures (and a lot of his successes) as a painter. Many of his paintings are biblical in nature, but as his talent and notoriety grew, he was commissioned more regularly for portraits. Techniques Applied The Mona Lisa is an oil painting, with a cottonwood panel as the surface. It is unusual in that most paintings are commissioned as oil on canvas, but the cottonwood panel is part of what has attributed to the fame of the painting.

Because of the medium used for the image, the Mona Lisa has survived for six centuries without ever having been restored–a trait very unusual when considering the time period of the piece. While most of the artwork of the Renaissance period depicts biblical scenes, it was the style and technique of the paintings of this period which make them distinguished from other eras of artwork. Anatomically correct features are one of the identifiable marks of this period of history in art, and the Mona Lisa stands out amongst the great paintings for the detail in her hands, eyes, and lips. Da Vinci used a shadowing technique at the corners of her lips as well as the corners of her eyes which give her an extremely lifelike appearance and look of amusement. Her portrait is such that to an observer, they are standing right before Lisa Del Giocondo, with the arms of her chair as the barrier between the observer and the subject of the painting. Da Vinci also created a background with aerial views and a beautiful landscape, but muted from the vibrant lightness of the subject’s face and hands. The technique Da Vinci used in executing the painting left behind no visible brush marks, something that was said to make any master painter lose heart. It is truly a masterpiece.

Theft The Mona Lisa disappeared from the Louvre in France in 1911. Pablo Picasso was on the original list of suspects questioned and jailed for the theft, but he was later exonerated. For two years, the masterpiece was thought to be forever lost. However in 1913, Italian patriot Vincenzo Perugia was arrested for the crime of stealing the famous painting, and the original artwork returned to its home at the Louvre in Paris. Perugia was an employee of the Louvre at the time, and he believed the painting belonged to Italy. For two years he kept the famous piece of art housed in his apartment, but was discovered when he tried selling to a gallery in Florence, Italy. Vandalism Over the centuries, the famous painting has withstood attempts at vandalism as well. The first occurrence of vandalism was in 1956 when somebody threw acid at the bottom half, severely damaging the timeless masterpiece. That same year, another vandal threw a rock at the work, removing a chip of paint from near her elbow. It was later painted over. Afterwards, the piece was put under bulletproof glass as a means of protection has kept the painting from further attempts at vandalism and destruction.

This painting has long been caricaturized in cartoons, has been replicated all over the world, and has been studied by scholars and art enthusiasts alike. The painting is the most widely recognized work of art in the entire world. The oil on cottonwood panel commission of Francesco del Giocondo’s used such precise detail to give an unbelievably lifelike appearance to the painting’s subject. This piece of Renaissance artwork completely changed the techniques and style of painting, and is revered around the world as the greatest masterpiece of all time. 60 responses to “Mona Lisa” Famous Paintings - Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci Political Art Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa painting, in the Louvre in Paris , is arguably the most famous painting in the world. It is probably also the best known example of sfumato , a painting technique partly responsible for her enigmatic smile. There's been a lot of speculation about who the woman in the painting was. It's thought to be a portrait of Lisa Gherardini, wife of a Florentine cloth merchant called Francesco del Giocondo.

(The 16th-century art writer Vasari was among the first to suggest this, in his Lives of the Artists.) It's also been suggested the reason for her smile was that she was pregnant . Art historians know Leonardo had begun the Mona Lisa by 1503, as a record of it was made in that year by a senior Florentine official, Agostino Vespucci. When he finished it is less certain. The Louvre originally dated the painting to 1503-06, but discoveries made in 2012 suggest it may have been as much as a decade later before it was finished based on the background being based on a drawing of rocks he is known to have done in n 1510-15.1 The Louvre changed the dates to 1503-19 in March 2012. You'll have to elbow your way through the crowds to see it "in the flesh" rather than as a reproduction. Is it worthwhile? I'd have to say "probably" rather than "definitely".

I was disappointed the first time I saw it as I'd never truly realized just how small a painting it was because I'm used to seeing it poster-sized. It's only 30x20" (77x53cm) in size. You wouldn't even need to spread your arms out all the way to pick it up. But that said, could you really visit the Louvre and not go to see it at least once? Just patiently work your way towards the front of the admiring horde, then take your time looking at the way the colors have been used. Simply because it's such a familiar painting, doesn't mean it isn't worthwhile spending time with it. It's worth doing with a quality reproduction too, as the more you look the more you see. Just what is in the landscape behind her? Which way are her eyes looking? How did he paint that fabulous drapery? The more you look, the more you see, even though initially it may feel so familiar a painting.

See Also: 25 Secrets of Mona Lisa Revealed 25 Secrets of Mona Lisa Revealed By Jeanna Bryner, Managing Editor | October 18, 2007 12:23pm ET MORE Images of the Mona Lisa reveal hidden details in infrared and visible light. Credit: PRNewsFoto/RYP Australia. New images uncover 25 secrets about the Mona Lisa, including proof that Leonardo da Vinci gave her eyebrows, solving a long-held mystery. The images are part of an exhibition, "Mona Lisa Secrets Revealed," which features new research by French engineer Pascal Cotte and debuts in the United States at the Metreon Center in San Francisco, where it will remain through the end of this year. The Mona Lisa showcase is part of a larger exhibition called "Da Vinci: An Exhibition of Genius." Cotte, founder of Lumiere Technology, scanned the painting with a 240-megapixel Multi-spectral Imaging Camera he invented, which uses 13 wavelengths from ultraviolet light to infrared. The resulting images peel away centuries of varnish and other alterations, shedding light on how the artist brought the painted figure to life and how she appeared to da Vinci and his contemporaries.

"The face of Mona Lisa appears slightly wider and the smile is different and the eyes are different," Cotte said. "The smile is more accentuated I would say." [ Why Does Mona Lisa's Smile Change? ] Mona Lisa mysteries A zoomed-in image of Mona Lisa's left eye revealed a single brush stroke in the eyebrow region, Cotte said. "I am an engineer and scientist, so for me all has to be logical. It was not logical that Mona Lisa does not have any eyebrows or eyelashes," Cotte told LiveScience. "I discovered one hair of the eyebrow." Another conundrum had been the position of the subject's right arm, which lies across her stomach. This was the first time, Cotte said, that a painter had rendered a subject's arm and wrist in such a position. While other artists had never understood da Vinci's reasoning, they copied it nonetheless. [ Photos: Anatomy Meets Art in Da Vinci's Drawings ] Cotte discovered the pigment just behind the right wrist matched up perfectly with that of the painted cover that drapes across Mona Lisa 's knee. So it did make sense: The forearm and wrist held up one side of a blanket. "The wrist of the right hand is up high on the stomach.

But if you look deeply in the infrared you understand that she holds a cover with her wrist," Cotte said. Behind a painting The infrared images also revealed da Vinci's preparatory drawings that lie behind layers of varnish and paint, showing that the Renaissance man was also human. "If you look at the left hand you see the first position of the finger, and he changed his mind for another position," Cotte said. "Even Leonardo da Vinci had hesitation." Other revelations include: Lace on Mona Lisa's dress The transparency of the veil shows da Vinci first painted a landscape and then used transparency techniques to paint the veil atop it. A change in the position of the left index and middle finger. The elbow was repaired from damage due to a rock thrown at the painting in 1956. The blanket covering Mona Lisa's knees also covers her stomach. The left finger was not completely finished. A blotch mark on the corner of the eye and chin are varnish accidents, countering claims that Mona Lisa was sick. And the Mona Lisa was painted on uncut poplar board, contrary to speculations.

In the larger picture, Cotte said when he stands back and looks up at the enlarged infrared image of Mona Lisa, her beauty and mystique are apparent. "If you are in front of this huge enlargement of Mona Lisa, you understand instantly why Mona Lisa is so famous," Cotte said. He added, it's something you have to see with your own eyes. Arts: The Mona Lisa experience | Art and design | The Guardian Share on Messenger Close Objectively, this is a very bad tourist experience. At least at the Eiffel Tower, the other highlight of travel-brochure Paris, you get the excitement of the lift and an incredible view. Here you get one small, dark picture surrounded by a jostling crowd of hundreds. It is hard to see how anyone can genuinely enjoy looking at the painting in these circumstances, which probably explains why most people don't. A few seconds, a few photographs and the line moves on. The speed with which the majority of visitors deal with this tourist obligation is astonishing. And yet, unless they have anarchist tendencies, no first-time visitor to Paris would consider skipping it. The Mona Lisa remains the most famous painting in the world.

This year the crowds lining up to see it have grown thicker than ever, with the influx of millions of new Chinese tourists into Europe . A day spent in the room where the picture hangs reveals much about the global tourist industry - illustrating which countries are doing well enough economically to allow their middle classes the chance to visit France. It casts only scant light on why people still bother to come in their thousands to pay homage to the painting. If you starting queuing well before the Louvre's doors open at 9am, and walk briskly through a network of long galleries that stand between the entrance hall and the first-floor room where the painting hangs, you can reach the Mona Lisa at about 9.09, before anyone else. For a short few minutes it is cool and quiet. A guard is rearranging the crowd barriers in the centre of the room with careful precision. Four Chinese tourists are the first visitors at 9.11. They arrive, visibly delighted, and begin to examine the picture, holding their hands up to shield their eyes against a sun which isn't there. They take a few pictures of the painting and then of each other in front of the painting. Their delight lasts for about 50 seconds, after which they hurry off.

The rumble of dozens of approaching feet is already audible by 9.14, as dozens of people make their way rapidly down the grand gallery, rushing past Caravaggios, Bellinis, Raphaels and a few other da Vincis, guided by the Mona Lisa signposts. By 9.20 there is a group of 28 people standing in front of the painting and fathers are already having to hold their children above the crowd so that they can see. "People come because she is famous. Period," says Pete Brown, a retired businessman from Iowa, with some irritation. "But you want my opinion honestly? I'm not overly impressed." At 9.30 the crowd has grown to about 47. Mobile phones are used to take pictures. Children show their parents how to use the equipment. The noise of the clicking of shutters, the buzzing of zooms whirring in and out, the satisfied pips of the machinery signalling its readiness, becomes overwhelming. Some couples kiss as they walk away, happy that another part of the Paris experience has been completed.

At 10.14 the mass of people is 12 rows deep; 15 minutes later there are so many people elbowing from behind that it becomes uncomfortable to stand at the curved wooden barrier by the front of the picture. "She must be one of the ugliest women in the world," a teenager mutters. Waiting to see the Mona Lisa has all the thrill of standing in an airport check-in queue. The crowd pushes forward, cattle-like and unquestioning, performing a ritual they know they have to go through with in order to complete a pre-ordained tourist experience. By midday the room is seething with visitors, the line heaves towards the front, a slow, weary museum trudge, and around 70 more people file in every minute. Caged in a box of bullet-proof glass, the picture looks unimpressive under the harsh institutional lighting. Winking dots of red and orange reflected camera eyes dance across the canvas and every few seconds the Mona Lisa's face is obscured by another flash. "I don't know why they keep coming," Stephane, a security guard who has worked for the Louvre for the past two years, says.

"It's a nice painting, but there are many more interesting pictures elsewhere in the museum. People don't look at it anyway. They come in, take a picture and leave. It takes 15 seconds." "People no longer study it. It is no longer a painting, but has become a symbol of a painting," says Darian Leader, author of Stealing the Mona Lisa: What Art Stops Us From Seeing. Looking at the visitors from the front of the crowd, about half have their faces pressed into a camera. Those at the back arch onto tiptoes, hold their arms far above their head and take a picture, paparazzi-style. You have to feel sorry for Salvator Rosa, whose pictures hang to the left and the right of the Mona Lisa. No one spares a glance for the enormous Heroic Battle, 1652, to the left, with its dramatic portrayal of carnage. There must have been a time when this would have been the more obvious crowd-gatherer, but a sequence of quite random events has transformed the Mona Lisa over the past century into a celebrity painting. Before the 1789 revolution, scarcely anyone had access to it.

Then, with the creation of the Louvre, it was for some time kept in the curator's bureau, away from the hordes, and valued much less than Leonardo's Virgin and Child with St Anne. But as the romantic poets of the 19th century began to be obsessed with the femme fatale, the Mona Lisa was seized on as an ideal of womanhood, her smile and the eyes venerated. The confusion over quite who she was increased her allure. Donald Sassoon, author of Becoming Mona Lisa - The History of the World's Most Famous Painting, points out that such was the profusion of religious paintings of saints, famous royals, skinny Dutch women and obese Rubens females, that there weren't that many other paintings of unknown, beautiful women to choose as the object of male fantasies. Then just as the painting was gaining mass recognition, it was stolen in 1911, at a time when popular newspapers were booming. The image was reproduced globally as the search began. Such was the painting's new significance, that people lined up to stare at the empty space where the picture had been hanging. The story of the theft and its rediscovery inspired dozens of books and films.

Then came the lampooning of the work by Marcel Duchamp, the appropriation of the image by surrealists, pop artists, and finally by the advertising industry. Art historian EH Gombrich says the picture has become so worn out by all these references that it's almost impossible "to see it with fresh eyes". But the reality is that in the Louvre, you cannot really see the painting at all for the far more practical reason that there are too many other people in front of it. Some visitors are quite open about their frustration. "The Mona Lisa is probably the single most disappointing piece of work in the entire world," Guy Kress, an experimental psychologist from California, says. "The picture everyone has in their minds is much larger and brighter." It is true that the poster reproduction in the museum shop is a much bolder image. With this fresh in your mind, the original looks dour and gloomy. Moonkyou Kim, a tour guide with a group of 16 tourists from Seoul, taking a 10-day whirlwind tour of Europe with 24 hours in France , says the anti-climax is palpable. "People aren't very happy when they see it. It's too small.

They don't believe it's the original." But of the 51 people approached randomly over the day, the majority still say the picture is wonderful and they are thrilled to have seen it. Despite the crush and the inconvenience there is for many a reluctance to question the value of the experience. To doubt that the Mona Lisa is worth seeing is a bit like asking whether it's worth coming to Paris at all. The Mona Lisa is a key part of the Paris package, and one of the reasons why you come to France, why you come to Europe. For most tourists this moment will be a critical part of their memory of France as a whole. To come here and not be amazed or delighted is in some way to admit that the whole Paris experience is somehow not as great as it's cracked up to be. Most people know this is illogical, and yet they buy into it anyway. "When you come to Paris for the first time, you have to see the cliches. You can't be too proud," Oded Hauptaman, an opthamologist from Melbourne says. Among the thousands who process past throughout the day, there are very few who pause to look hard.

Takuya Sejima is an exception, stopping for over 30 minutes, holding his hand up towards his eyes at different angles, using his museum plan to help measure different sections of the painting, making notes. Next to the rushing masses, his behaviour looks eccentric, verging on the insane. An 18-year-old art student from Tokyo, he wants to assess why daVinci made the left hand so much larger than the right hand, and so out of proportion with the face. "It's marvellous. It's difficult to express why in words," he says. Later the tourists become wearier, their legs heavier, more prone to squabbling with their partners. The number of tour groups dwindles. The number of French visitors increases. Leading away his small group of French art enthusiasts, Bruno de Baecque explains: "People invest a lot of hope into the prospect of seeing the Mona Lisa for the first time. It becomes a quasi-sacred experience. They're ready to suffer considerable discomfort to extract some pleasure from the experience. No one can really know if they're disappointed.

I tell people to try to enjoy the thrill of seeing the painting surrounded by crowds." By 9.30pm there are only about 10 people left in the room, and for the first time all day there's time to really examine the painting. But as closing time approaches, guards shoo the remaining visitors away so that only Mohamed Elabdi, the night cleaner, remains sweeping away the mound of rubbish discarded over the day at the foot of the painting. After 30 years in France, he saw the painting for the first time three days ago when he started this new job with the Louvre. "It's hard to hard to understand what the fuss is about," he says. "But the way that the eyes follow you around the room as you work is disconcerting." Proof 'original' Mona Lisa was painted by Leonardo da Vinci - Telegraph Leonardo da Vinci Proof 'original' Mona Lisa was painted by Leonardo da Vinci New tests on a painting billed as the original version of the Mona Lisa, Leonardo da Vinci's 15th century portrait, have produced fresh proof that it is the work of the Italian master.

The "Mona Lisa" in the Paris Louvre for over three centuries has long been regarded as the only one painted by Leonardo Photo: AFP/GETTY 12:16AM GMT 14 Feb 2013 The tests, one by a specialist in "sacred geometry" and the other by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, were carried out in the wake of the Geneva unveiling of the painting, the "Isleworth Mona Lisa", last September. "When we add these new findings to the wealth of scientific and physical studies we already had, I believe anyone will find the evidence of a Leonardo attribution overwhelming," said David Feldman vice-president of the foundation said. The "Mona Lisa" in the Paris Louvre for over three centuries has long been regarded as the only one painted by Leonardo - although there have been copies - and claims for the Swiss-held one were dismissed by some experts last year. But it also won support in the art world, encouraging the Zurich-based Mona Lisa Foundation - an international group which says it has no financial interest in the work - to pursue efforts to demonstrate its authenticity.

Mr Feldman, an Irish-born international art and stamp dealer, said he was contacted after the public unveiling of the portrait - which shows a much younger woman than in the Louvre - by Italian geometrist Alfonso Rubino. Related Articles Leonardo da Vinci: Anatomist, review 30 Apr 2012 "He has made extended studies of the geometry of Leonardo's Vitruvian Man" - a sketch of a youth with arms and legs extended - "and offered to look at our painting to see if it conformed," Mr Feldman said. The conclusion by the Padua-based Rubino was that the "Isleworth" portrait - named for a London suburb where it was kept by British art connoisseur Hugh Blaker 80-90 years ago - matched Leonardo's geometry and must be his. The Zurich institute, the Foundation said, carried out a carbon-dating test on the canvas of its painting and found that it was almost certainly manufactured between 1410 and 1455 - refuting claims that it was a late 16th century copy. Earlier brush-stroke studies presented last September by U.S.

physicist and art lover John Asmus concluded that both the "original" version and the Louvre crowd-puller were painted by the same artist. The authenticity of the foundation's painting, discovered by Blaker in an English country house in 1913, has been fiercely challenged by British Leonardo authority Martin Kemp, who argued last year that "so much is wrong with it." Mr Feldman and foundation colleagues retort that Kemp has never followed up on invitations to come to see it. Documents show that a painting of his wife Lisa was commissioned around the turn of the 16th century by Florentine nobleman Francesco del Giacondo. In French, the Louvre version is known as "La Giaconde" and "La Giaconda" in Italian. Supporters of the "younger" version say it was almost certainly delivered unfinished to del Giacondo before Leonardo left Italy in 1506 and took up residence in France, where he died in 1519 in a small Loire chateau.

From the Giacondo house, it probably eventually found its way to England after being bought by a travelling English aristocrat, this account runs, while the Paris version was probably painted by Leonardo around 1516 in France. Source: Reuters Painting the Mona Lisa - Contemporary Art Style - YouTube Painting the Mona Lisa - Contemporary Art Style Want to watch this again later? Sign in to add this video to a playlist. Need to report the video? Sign in to report inappropriate content. Rating is available when the video has been rented. This feature is not available right now. Please try again later. Published on Jul 5, 2014 Painting the Leonardo Da Vinci's Mona Lisa but in a modern contemporary art style. Acrylic painting is 16 x 20 on stretched canvas.. Thank you for watching! Author(s): Cécile Scailliérez This portrait was doubtless started in Florence around 1503. It is thought to be of Lisa Gherardini, wife of a Florentine cloth merchant named Francesco del Giocondo - hence the alternative title, La Gioconda. However, Leonardo seems to have taken the completed portrait to France rather than giving it to the person who commissioned it.

After his death, the painting entered François I's collection. Lisa Gherardini, wife of Francesco Giocondo The history of the Mona Lisa is shrouded in mystery. Among the aspects which remain unclear are the exact identity of the sitter, who commissioned the portrait, how long Leonardo worked on the painting, how long he kept it, and how it came to be in the French royal collection. The portrait may have been painted to mark one of two events - either when Francesco del Giocondo and his wife bought their own house in 1503, or when their second son, Andrea, was born in December 1502 after the death of a daughter in 1499. The delicate dark veil that covers Mona Lisa's hair is sometimes considered a mourning veil. In fact, such veils were commonly worn as a mark of virtue. Her clothing is unremarkable. Neither the yellow sleeves of her gown, nor her pleated gown, nor the scarf delicately draped round her shoulders are signs of aristocratic status. A new artistic formula The Mona Lisa is the earliest Italian portrait to focus so closely on the sitter in a half-length portrait.

The painting is generous enough in its dimensions to include the arms and hands without them touching the frame. The portrait is painted to a realistic scale in the highly structured space where it has the fullness of volume of a sculpture in the round. The figure is shown in half-length, from the head to the waist, sitting in a chair whose arm is resting on balusters. She is resting her left arm on the arm of the chair, which is placed in front of a loggia, suggested by the parapet behind her and the two fragmentary columns framing the figure and forming a "window" looking out over the landscape. The perfection of this new artistic formula explains its immediate influence on Florentine and Lombard art of the early 16th century. Such aspects of the work as the three-quarter view of a figure against a landscape, the architectural setting, and the hands joined in the foreground were already extant in Flemish portraiture of the second half of the 15th century, particularly in the works of Hans Memling. However, the spacial coherence, the atmospheric illusionism, the monumentality, and the sheer equilibrium of the work were all new.

In fact, these aspects were also new to Leonardo's work, as none of his earlier portraits display such controlled majesty. An emblematic smile The Mona Lisa's famous smile represents the sitter in the same way that the juniper branches represent Ginevra Benci and the ermine represents Cecilia Gallerani in their portraits, in Washington and Krakow respectively. It is a visual representation of the idea of happiness suggested by the word "gioconda" in Italian. Leonardo made this notion of happiness the central motif of the portrait: it is this notion which makes the work such an ideal. The nature of the landscape also plays a role. The middle distance, on the same level as the sitter's chest, is in warm colors. Men live in this space: there is a winding road and a bridge. This space represents the transition between the space of the sitter and the far distance, where the landscape becomes a wild and uninhabited space of rocks and water which stretches to the horizon, which Leonardo has cleverly drawn at the level of the sitter's eyes. Bibliography - ARASSE Daniel, Léonard de Vinci, Éditions Hazan, Paris,1997.

- BEGUIN Sylvie (sous la dir. de), Musée du Louvre. Hommage à Léonard de Vinci, catalogue de l'exposition, Éditions des Musées nationaux, Paris, 1952. - BEGUIN Sylvie, Léonard de Vinci au Louvre, Éditions de la Réunion des musées nationaux, Paris, 1983. - CLARK Kenneth, Léonard de Vinci, Éditions Le Livre de poche, Paris, 1967. - CHASTEL André, L'illustre incomprise. Mona Lisa, collection "Art et Écrivain", Éditions Gallimard, Paris, 1988. - CHASTEL André, Léonard de Vinci, Traité de la peinture, Éditions Calmann-Lévy, Paris, 2003. - KEMP Martin, Leonardo Da Vinci : the marvelous Works of Nature and Man, Cambridge Mass. : Harvard University Press, 1981.

- MARANI Pietro C., Léonard de Vinci, Éditions Gallimard-Electa, Paris, 1996. - SCALLIEREZ Cécile, La Joconde, collection "Solo", Éditions de la Réunion des musées nationaux, Paris, 2003, n°24. - ZÖLLNER Frank, Leonardo da Vinci, Mona Lisa, Das Portrât der Lisa del Giocondo, Legende und geschichte, Francfort, 1994. - ZÖLLNER Frank, NATHAN Johannes (sous la dir. de), Léonard de Vinci, 1452-1519 : tout l'oeuvre peint et graphique, Cologne, Londres, Paris, Éditions Taschen, 2003. Technical description Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, known as LEONARDO DA VINCI (Vinci, 1452 - Amboise, 1519) Portrait of Lisa Gherardini, wife of Francesco del Giocondo, known as the Mona Lisa (the Joconde in French) c.

1503–19 H. 0.77 m; W. 0.53 m Acquired by François I in 1518 INV. 779

Question: The 'Mona Lisa' was painted by which artist?
Answer: Leonardo da Vinci